


a nameless color

by mortalitasi



Series: wishing in frankincense [1]
Category: The Arcana (Visual Novel)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Lite Smut™, Other, Romance, TAKE A SHOT EVERY TIME I MENTION HANDS OR HAIR
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-01
Updated: 2018-05-01
Packaged: 2019-04-30 13:05:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14497602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mortalitasi/pseuds/mortalitasi
Summary: Dreams show us our deepest desires-- the world as it could be. As itshouldbe.Asra dreams often, and he is not always alone.





	a nameless color

**Author's Note:**

> hold me, these two make me sad

She dreams differently tonight, of a moonlight mirage… a lightspun lover, with stars in his hands.  
  
They are tangled together, skin to skin, dark and pale, sigh and gasp. And over it all, his voice, whispering her name in sweet refrain: "Ari, Ari…"  
  
First they're standing on the cobbled market road, hands linked, surrounded by the flaring scents of cardamom and nutmeg; this bakery is their favorite, was their favorite, will always be that, even when she doesn't remember. He is too eager to eat and flushes with surprise when she laughs and kisses a whorl of custard off his nose.  
  
The colors blend and melt away, running down and over the edges of the floor like watery paint, filling the gutters with light and memory. Now they're by the tailor's, and she is darning cloaks as he tells stories, sitting under that striped awning that hides them from the afternoon sun. She is young, younger than she can ever recall being, and she steals shy glances at him when she thinks he can't see. He is just as subtle (which is to say, not at all); he tracks the movement of her hands across fabric and thread like it's precious to him, committing to memory every detail, from the white sleeves tucked and rolled up to her elbows, to the flowering pattern on her silvery thimble.  
  
They talk about where he's been and where he would like to go over tea: he loves his smoky lapsang souchong, but she prefers earthier, sweeter blends, and sips at a chilled brew of ironwort while he describes the strange feeling of sailing for the first time when all you've known is solid land. Being with him is like sailing, she comes to realize. Every time she believes she's gained her balance, he steals it from her, and there is more for her to learn. She earns her sea-legs for him, walking steady among the swaying tides of his heart. She doesn't worry about what might happen should she go under. She has always been an excellent swimmer.  
  
The tailory storefront fades, and is replaced by the resplendent beauty of the Vesuvian waterfront at sunrise. Reflections of orange and gold chase each other across the mirrored surface of the sea; they are huddled together under the sheltering arms of the vines clinging to the rocks, bougainvillea and wisteria, fuchsia and lilac. He remembers the fine slip of her hair in his hands, the mint on her breath, the warmth of her beside him under the shared cloak. He kisses her when she leans into him, eager to have her closer, eager to keep her there. She whispers his name and liquid heat spreads through his veins, better than any sun or fire or ember.  
  
"I love you," she says, when they part.  
  
She's looking up at him, pillowed on the blanket they laid on the ground, cheeks flushed pink, inhaling deep. Her fingers are curled in his shirt, her eyes wide and trusting. He's never seen anything more wonderful.  
  
But there is a another memory seeping forward, awakened, similar but different.  
  
The shop. Beloved. Familiar.  
  
Morning is arriving, and she still hasn't prepared her dailies, or set out the good tablecloth, or even started breakfast. There's no light except what can be gleaned by coming of dawn. She tries to rise early, so she can have all the time she needs to make sure everything is just right.  
  
They very nearly knock over her mother's housewarming gift when he advances, hefting her up in his arms. She has to reach out over his shoulder, striking like a snake, grabbing the stand by the edge and gripping it until it stabilizes. The vase on top wobbles, once, twice—and then lies still.  
  
"Oops," he says, sounding just about as unapologetic as one can. His foxlike grin is full of pretty much everything except contrition.  
  
She sighs and lets go, but a nervous giggle escapes, ruffling his white curls. She had to bend herself almost out of his embrace to make the saving catch. "That was close."  
  
"Well. Where were we?" he asks. Her hands come to rest on his chest, and he walks them back a step, then two, so that she is pressed up against the wall, slender legs hooked around his waist.  
  
She smirks at him, carding her fingers through the fine hair at his nape. "I'm sure it'll come back to you."  
  
"Hmm," he hums, and moves his mouth to the darkening mark on her neck. "Somewhere around here…?"  
  
She chuckles, voice thrumming under her skin. "You're on the right track."  
  
He breathes in. Powder-sweet and citrus tang. Delicious. She is so near, and he can touch her all he wants. The thought almost makes him dizzy with delight. The downy fabric of her violet nightgown brushes at his wrists. It's ridden so far up it may as well be a shirt now. She hasn't even changed into her day clothes yet—he likes her like this, playful and all guile, her hair still caught in its messy sleep braid, flyaways framing her lovely face.  
  
"Here?" he says, mapping the line of her jaw with a feather-light kiss. "Or here?" He carefully presses in on her, letting her feel, and is rewarded with a breathy gasp and her reflexively pulling him in further.  
  
"Tease," she accuses, but with no malice. "The pants can go now."  
  
He has to laugh at that, even though there's a blush burning on his cheeks and ears. "I'll see what I can do."  
  
The surroundings blur, time and space molding around them like pliant clay.  
  
When everything is clear again, they are no longer downstairs, but twined with one another on her bed. He is already moving inside her; the sunlight spilling in through the window next to the headboard is warm on his back, but not warmer than her hands, splayed over his shoulders, clutching at his arms with desperate devotion. She arches up to meet him almost every time he presses in, sighing her delight, so soft, so sublime—he could lose his mind, here, in her, and he would be happy for it.  
  
She is peppered everywhere with tiny beauty marks, across her shoulders, on her breasts, and on her wrists and arms; there is one near the hollow of her collarbone that he kisses the next time he pushes forward, and she melts beneath him, sighing his name.  
  
The pleasure of sharing this with her is so acute it borders on pain. He wants her to know how important she is. How irreplaceable she has become to him. Can he say it without speaking? He's not sure any combination of existent words would suffice, anyway.  
  
She tightens around him, and the question is burned away. She shudders in his embrace, a moan on her lips—heat lances through him, and he has to look at her: she is so close to completion, and he could send her there with his next touch. He leads one of his hands down between them, gentle, and feels her immediate reaction when he finds what he was searching for.  
  
“Ah, please,” she pleads, trying to rock herself upward into the contact.  
  
He brushes his lips over her temple, his fingers drawing circles against her, dipping close to where they're joined. “Let go,” he whispers to her, and she does.  
  
It's beautiful—and her fulfilment makes it that much easier to reach his own. He spends himself; it leaves him boneless with its sudden drain on his strength, the crushing, euphoric relief, and the almost melancholy emptiness of realizing the moment has ended. His arms wobble—he has to list to the side so that he doesn't end up falling atop her, separating them, and drops his head onto the only other pillow on the bed.  
  
As he catches his breath, he watches her catch hers. She's totally bare, every single imperfect loveliness about her available to him: some would say she is too slender, or too small-chested, too short—too ready, too loud, too _curious._ But it is all of these things that make her who she is, and he adores that whole person, not just one or two neatly-chosen parts of her.  
  
He has never been happier.  
  
She turns to lie on her stomach, her hair spilling in a black curtain over her shoulders and back, pooling on the mattress. There isn't much space on the bed, but it's not even a problem. She smiles at him, and his heart stutters.  
  
_Did this actually happen? Or did I just want it to?_  
  
“Does it matter?” she says, reaching out and tracing the curve of his face with one careful hand. Backlit in the morning sun, she is glowing, a vision from a dream. “We're both right here, right now. And I love you, Asra.”  
  
His eyes sting. “I love you, too,” he answers—and just being able to say that feels like the best of spells.  
  
She drops her head down to kiss him, smoothing the curls away from his forehead. He pulls her back when she retreats, making her linger, stroking the backs of his fingers over her cheek. She smells of him—even her magic is humming with the song of his spirit. Their auras are blending, creating a new, nameless color. He doesn't want to forget this.  
  
“Sleep,” she tells him, her voice husky with affection. “I'll be here when you wake up.”  
  
He trusts her. He always has.

 

 

* * *

 

   
  
  
He's back where they first met—sitting in a makeshift booth behind the magic shop, greeting strangers with a flourish, beckoning them to his little table with promises of destiny. He awes them with tricks and makes splendors of their plain masks and unremarkable robes. Most of them are not even flickers across the canvas of his awareness. Pleasant enough in the instant he's experiencing it, but ultimately unimportant.  
  
The next customer is dressed in purple and red; her black sash is laced in gold discs, like coins, and along her wrists sparkle bracelets of metal and beaded leather. She's short, but willowy, built like a songbird—a strangely specific comparison to be applied to someone he _just_ met, but it seems right. Her hair is ebon-dark, her eyes green, their pupils hemmed in by a circle of yellow. She has an interesting countenance, open and kind and proud.  
  
“Hello,” she says. Her voice is distinct enough that it is easy to pick apart from the buzz of the streets. “I've heard that I could have my fortune told here.”  
  
“You heard right,” he responds, reaching for his satchel. “You don't look like you need a splendor.”  
  
She laughs, bright and joyful. “I'll take that as a compliment.”  
  
He smiles at her. She has a nice laugh. “You should.”  
  
Her inquisitive gaze follows him as he withdraws his deck, setting it atop the table—well, it’s more of a tall stool, really—between them. “Do you only offer three card spreads?”  
  
The question probably surprises him more than it should. “During Masquerades—yes,” he finally replies, thumbing the back of one of the cards. “You like tarot?”  
  
The grin she gives him is one part mischief, one part satisfaction. “You could say that,” she remarks. “I would be a very bad investment for Auntie if I had no interest.” She looks up at him through the fringe of her thick lashes. “Scoping out the competition I’ll be having isn’t such a bad idea, either.”  
  
He feels his brows rise, betraying his curiosity. “You’re the shopkeep’s niece?”  
  
Her grin grows wider, her cheeks dimpling. She’s elated he caught on so fast. “The one and only! I heard a cute fortune teller was doing readings in our backstreet—and I couldn’t resist.”  
  
She’s pretty smoothly-spoken for a girl who’s still a teenager. He has to admire her forthrightness, if nothing else. “Have I lived up to the expectations?” he asks, shuffling the cards expertly, relishing the sensation of their glossy coating.  
  
The girl in purple shrugs, her manner enigmatic. “That remains to be seen,” she says, though there’s no actual bite in her words, and she’s examining him with a keen regard he’s seen in very few. “I’m Ariadne.”  
  
He turns the deck in her direction—he wants to know what the cards have to tell this odd little person with attentive wisdom in her eyes and flowers on her vest. “I’m Asra,” he returns, having no idea how much this single interaction is going to alter the course of his life. He deals three cards for her, left to right, past to future. “Go ahead.”  
  
There’s a change in the air when she reaches for the first card, electrifying the atmosphere, setting his every hair on edge.  
  
“Wait,” he says, slowly, and she stops. “This—has happened before.”  
  
She smiles at him, and there’s something sad about it—it’s an old expression on a young face, a kind of sorrow Ariadne didn’t know when he met her. “You think about it a lot.”  
  
Clarity returns, cleansing his mind with its clarion call of understanding. He looks around the streets, now suddenly deserted and empty, at the Masquerade decorations hanging from windows and rafters, drifting listlessly in the breeze. The music and chatter has died—it is only them under the afternoon sun in the alley, standing opposite each other on each side of the table.  
  
A sharp spine of discomfort prickles in his chest. “How can I not?” he asks quietly, stretching a hand out to lace their fingers together. “This is where everything began to change.”  
  
“Neither of us had any idea,” she says. Her thumb brushes over the steeple of his knuckles.  
  
He blinks—in just an instant, the world has shifted.  
  
They are standing under the dusky sky of the Vesuvian seaside, where he saw her during the third year after that first Masquerade, and sold her charms made of seashells and silver thread. He looks at her—she is no longer seventeen, unmarked and uninitiated, and he is no longer living booth-to-booth, consigned to hovering on the edges of the city while he works to create a lasting, reliable reputation. She appears to him now—at least, in body—as she does in the waking world, the knowledge of her expression matching the rest of her. Her white tunic flutters around her bare legs. The sand shifts under his feet as he takes a step toward her.  
  
“Ari,” he says, not really having a conscious reason for it. Maybe he just does it to see the flare of recognition on her face, a familiarity he’s been starved for—it seems like ages that she’s looked at him and _seen_ him. Seen the past that links them. He touches his forehead to hers, breathing in the sea air and her scent.  
  
“I know you,” she whispers. “Asra.”  
  
A thrill races down his spine. “This really is a dream,” he murmurs, closing his eyes when she strokes a palm along his cheek. “I don’t want to hide anymore.”  
  
“It’s difficult,” she says sadly. Her fingers brush over his brow, his jaw, the curve of his temple. “I’m so sorry you have to endure this alone. I want to help. I wish I could. But when I wake up…”  
  
“…You won’t remember,” he finishes for her, sighing. He rubs his nose against hers, an almost-kiss. “It’s not all bad. You’ve come so far in just three years.”  
  
“Thanks to _you_ ,” she reminds him. “You saved me. Took me home. Became my family. I wouldn’t have flourished if you hadn’t been caring for me.”  
  
He laughs. “You always did give me a lot of credit.”  
  
“It’s because you deserve it, silly,” she says, sounding absolutely convinced of it, too. She nestles into him, leaning her cheek against his chest, listening to the beat of his heart with quiet reverence. “I wish we could stay like this.”  
  
His breath ruffles the curls at the top of her head. “That would be nice,” he agrees, linking his arms behind her, letting her rest on him. “In here, there’s no grief or hunger. No illness. No expectations.”  
  
“But no life, either,” she murmurs. “We can’t dream forever. But we still have time. Will you watch the sun come up with me?”  
  
He kisses her temple. “Of course.”  
  
They settle on a dune rather close to the whispering reach of the tide, legs brushing, hands joined. He watches her more than the sunrise, truth be told; she seems rested, peaceful. _Whole._ The sight of her this way is a balm for his soul. He has to take in as much as he can before he leaves this sanctuary and the safety of his memories.  
  
A breeze blows a gust of sand past them—in the growing light of the morning, it glitters like motes of gold, precious and fleeting.  
  
“You have to be careful,” she says, not looking away from the glorious glow on the horizon. “The creature in the palace is growing stronger by the day. Stronger and angrier.”  
  
He huffs at her, exasperated. “I’m not the one _living_ there.”  
  
She’s unbothered by the observation. “I can take care of myself. Even if I don’t remember it at the moment.”  
  
“I’m still coming back,” he reminds her. “I’ve been gone too long already.”  
  
“Just don’t put yourself in unnecessary risk for me,” Ariadne says, her gaze finally flicking to him, down to the space just above his heart, and back up again.  
  
“Too late.”  
  
“Any _more_ unnecessary risk,” she emphasizes, squeezing his hand.  
  
He can’t make that promise, and never has been able to. “I’ll take you to the cave,” he says. “You’re ready. I’ve been—too cautious, probably.”  
  
“You’ll be fine,” she assures him. “And I’ll be fine. I’ve done it before. I’ll do it again.”  
  
He can feel the tug of reality at the back of his head and neck, pulling him back like the strings on a puppet. “Ari…”  
  
She shifts in front of him, blocking out the sunlight and the glint of the glassy sea. Her hands cup his face, tender, barely there, her fingers pressing along his skin. He can see the shape of her so clearly—the colors in her eyes look to him brighter than anything around them, pine and amber, staring past his every secret and into the core of who he is.  
  
“I will always be with you,” she says, and she sounds like she is speaking to him from a very great distance.  
  
He reaches out to touch her, and it all dissolves.

 

* * *

  
  
  
  
He opens his eyes to the blue of the sky.  
  
His furred friend is still asleep beneath him—he can feel the rise and fall of their great flank at his back.  
  
The voice of the wind in the wheat is not the same as the wash of the waves on shore, but he can pretend.


End file.
